The Black Frost
La helada negra
Directed by
Argentina
2016
82 min
- Spanish
Fiction
Three farmers work on a farm in Entre Ríos, a sparsely populated lowland region of Argentina traversed by rivers. Their crops are affected by ‘black frost’ which threatens to destroy their harvest. One day, a young woman appears at their door; blithely and self-assuredly she begins to influence their familiar routines. The bewildered farmers yield to Alejandra’s interventions: she dons Heribertos’ dead wife’s clothes, accompanies Benigno to a greyhound race and wins young Lucas’ friendship. Shortly afterwards, the frost disappears.
Festivals
Labels & Line Ups
Credits
- Cast
- Ailín Salas
- Lucas Schell
- Benigno Lell
- Dario Wendler
- Mario Wendler
- Screenplay
- Maximiliano Schonfeld
- Cinematography
- Soledad Rodriguez
- Editing
- Anita Remon
- Production
- PASTO CINE
Press
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Precisely directed and elegantly shot.
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The dramatic feel, however, is the ominous listlessness reminiscent of Carlos Reygadas’s Silent Night or Carl Theodore Dreyer’s Ordet (The Word), or the foreboding of Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon, advancing in small steps of visual exactitude.
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An inarguable success.
Maximiliano Schonfeld
Argentina
Born in 1982 in Crespo, Argentina, Maximiliano studied Film and TV in the Córdoba National University and later graduated from the ENERC. He worked as an assistant director in films by Santiago Loza and Iván Fund, and directed the short films ESNORQUEL (2005), ENTRELUCES (2006) and INVERNARIO (2010). In 2012, he wrote and directed GERMANIA (2012), which was awarded the NDR Hamburg, Special Jury Award Bafici, Best Film and Best Director at Punta del Este. Schonfeld was then invited to participate at the DOX:LAB, program held by the Copenhagen Film Festival, for which he directed the medium-length AUSTER, with Estonian director Kadri Kõusaar. His second feature film, THE BLACK FROST (La Helada Negra), was selected at the Berlinale Panorama in 2016.
